Chickens, baby room, and tomato cages

I am in awe of the mercy of the Lord. 

Ephesians 2 4-5: But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ, by grace you have been saved; amen! 

Chickens: We've had our chickies for about three weeks now, I love them! Originally we wanted to start out with four but the farm we got our chickies from had some issues with all of the chickies born in their batch expect for these precious two:

It worked out that we started with two, we are new to chickens and it is also half the mess! They've lived inside with us for the past three weeks in a giant rubber maid container. Jeremy built an adorable coop for them to live in out of mostly recycled wood that we had on hand. He spent less than 100$ on the entire coop:

my hardworking husband making our chickies a new home

Hens will lay here; can't wait to harvest eggs!

From hinges, to paint, to reclaimed wood- my husband is so detail oriented

Finished Product

Our Border Collie Bree is Obsessed with the chickies

happy in their new home, look how big they've gotten in the past few weeks!

Putting the chickies in the new coop- I found it necessary to squeeze in too :)

We are planning to get two more baby chickies this week. We're starting out with the Americana breed. They are suppose to also have the blue egg gene so once our hens get old enough their eggs will be blue! These chickens are also known as "Easter Eggers," should be fun. We do plan on building a bigger coop eventually as our chicken population grows. On another note, now that I am a chicken owner/lover, I'm very sad with the way most chickens are treated. Buy free-range chicken eggs, y'all!

Small Sustainable Garden: Our garden is growing so much, I am getting so excited!! Our tomato plants are looking beautiful, we should have tomatoes soon! My crafty husband is not content with the flimsy store bought tomato cages so he bought much more durable wire and welded his own! He is so crafty and smart! I can't wait for fried green tomatoes and tomato sandwiches. We also have lots of banana peppers to harvest right now and lots more other veggies coming soon!

Tomato cages by Jeremy

Home Projects: Along with everything we've been doing outdoors, we've been very busy indoors as well! We are steadily working on baby Elijah's nursery. It will be very traditional, neutral colors with lots of color overlays. Jeremy and I had a conversation a few years ago that I've never forgotten: He told me he would like us to visit all of the National Parks in the United States. Lovingly, I told him no... I would go to a few but not all and that maybe he should take a friend to the rest. He told me he wouldn't take a friend on that many trips so I told him dismissively that maybe he would have a son. I saw immediate excitement in his eyes and he said, " I NEED TO HAVE A SON." So naturally, we chose a national park/outdoors theme in hopes it will rub off on Eli and he will grow up loving the outdoors as much as his Daddy. Here is our noted progress so far:

Glidden Cappuccino White for the walls

Behr Misty surf for the crib- which was given to us- just needed a few coats of paint and polyurethane

 

 I ordered a vintage bird identifying book to make framed prints for Eli

Crib is painted and in the room, just needs assembly, mattress, and bedding. :)

Sweet rocking chair for Eli from a local antique store

Burlap name banner for behind his crib

We still have lot's to do, but it is so fun gathering all the pieces. We are ordering a few vintage national park posters which I think will be what ties everything together. I can't wait to finish his room! 

Just the Beginning

I love the word of God, it is so sweet to our souls it is compared to delicious honey:

 Psalms 119:103 How sweet are your words to my taste, sweeter than honey to my mouth!

Missy-

Okay... where to begin? We're not really sure honestly. I think the most fun of this will be watching with my husband how all of this will play out. That is why I want to remember where we started, the funny and maybe not-so funny mistakes we will make and where we will end verses our beginning expectations. Which those expectations are: 

1. To make a small sustainable garden that will grow and produce enough for us to enjoy all year long and hopefully sell excess to willing buyers at farmer markets and other avenues. We plan to grow our plants year-round and preserve what is not used or sold fresh. 

2. We would like to have a decent amount of chickens for eggs and please don't judge us, but also eventually for chemical-free meat. 

3. We plan on eventually obtaining a small herd of Nigerian Dwarf goats for milk to make cheese, yogurt, soap and other great things. Also we would be breeding and selling the goats. 

4.Lastly and my greatest desire in this endeavor is to have two or more honey-bee hives. We want to harvest yummy honey and useful beeswax, we plan to bottle and sell the excess honey as well. 

A small sustainable garden: We've started our small garden, which will get bigger year-by-year but I find it to be pretty adorable:

We are growing corn, green beans, cucumber, squash, melons, strawberries and tomatoes of course! My friend Lara gave me a few pumpkin sprouts to plant. She also gave me oregano and mint (I can't wait to use it for mojitos!) that I will plant closer to the house. We also have a few blueberry bushes that were transplanted, originally from my great grandmother's home, dispersed around our property that are doing very well. We will have a fair amount of blue berries to harvest from them this year! We have a gigantic pear tree and wild black berries that also grow on our land.   

Chickens: We're getting chicks tomorrow! We were holding out for easter eggers, a non-specific breed holding the blue/green egg gene. So the eggs will be a beautiful blue/green! We will breed these cute chickies for a while and it will probably be years before we use them for meat, but that is the plan eventually.  This is one of the cute babies coming home with me tomorrow!

Honey Bee Hives: I am a bit weary to be around the bees in my condition (pregnant), and the time to order bees is ending soon. We have not been educated at all in the art of bee-keeping so we will spend the next year going to bee-keepers meetings (they exist), collecting knowledge, supplies, and contacts.

Nigerian Dwarf Goats: As for the goats we will need ADGA registered goats so we could breed them and sell them and they are expensive!!! So they will probably be saved for last once we have gotten into a good routine caring for our other creatures and projects. 

These are long-term dreams intermingled in preparing for a baby, fixing up our project-filled home and all of our other responsibilities. So we are being patient with ourselves and only taking on as much as we can enjoy. I feel very blessed to start this journey with my amazing husband. It is seriously the best to dream and work together with him.